In The News, July 3, 2017

In less than two years, a renovation of Moore Square in downtown Raleigh will be completed. Downtown Raleigh Alliance recently reported over $180 million dollars in ongoing or planned development is taking place in and around Moore Square. "The city will have put in roughly $20 million dollars of public investment," said Bill King. King serves as the Senior Director of Planning and Development for Downtown Raleigh Alliance. "We want to make sure (new development) blends nicely and that we have a nice mix of businesses that coexist with each other.”

The City of Lexington will begin a study of the city wastewater system and develop a 10-year management plan thanks to a $150,000 grant from the State of North Carolina. During its regular meeting on Monday, the Lexington City Council accepted a $150,000 grant from the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality to conduct a system management plan to study the wastewater treatment facility with the goal of prioritizing replacement and repairs and developing a 10-year capital improvement plan. City of Lexington Public Services Manager Roger Jones said the study would help develop a plan to update and repair the aging water plant and to extend current management plans.

As cities around the globe adopt new smart cities road maps and strategic plans for new technology implementations, the town of Cary, has taken an entirely different approach — one that leverages a combination of their existing facilities, citizens and private-sector companies. Rather than overlaying sensors or building new infrastructure from the ground up, Cary is inviting private-sector companies to incubate their technologies inside the existing Town Hall campus — a self-described "mini-city" that provides an optimal test-bed for Internet of Things (IoT) technologies across the following city domains: smart parking, energy and utilities, public safety, traffic management, citizen engagement, and IT co-creation.

Two area businesses will serve as rest stops for hundreds of bicyclists participating in a mountains to the coast ride that will traverse the area in the fall. Cycle NC reached out to Duck-Rabbit Craft Brewery in Farmville and Simply Natural Creamery in Ayden to see if each would be interested in serving as stops for the 19th annual ride. "I’m excited. It is neat, and will bring a lot of people here, so they can see where we are located,” brewery owner Paul Philippon said, adding Duck-Rabbit will offer the cyclists beer samples and tours of the brewery.